This invention relates to articles that include thermosetting-powder surface-coatings, and especially to methods of their manufacture of the kind in which a thermosetting organic powder-coating material applied to a surface is heated to melt and cure the powder and thereby form a coating bonded to the surface.
Methods of the above-specified kind are known, in particular in connection with the manufacture of panels for doors, partitions and other purposes, in which at least the front surface of a sheet of metal that is to provide the facing sheet of the panel, is coated evenly with an epoxy or other thermosetting organic powder-coating material, and is then stoved to heat the powder to a temperature at which it melts and cures so as to form, on cooling, a hard protective face-coating to the metal sheet. The coating affords protection to the metal, and pigmentation in the powder can be used to give color for decorative effect.
Although manufacturing techniques of this known nature, and the products of such techniques, are widely used, it has been found that they are applicable in even wider contexts than heretofore. It is an object of the present invention to extend their application in this regard.